An ongoing study of 'Interactive Magic Tricks'

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How interactive dose a trick online, television or radio have to be in order for it to be classed interactive? And… If a trick is too interactive. Will that spoil the magic?

I’ll discuss the latter first. Here is an example of a trick that I feel is too interactive. There seem to be many videos on YouTube where the magician askes you to ‘click’ on an a playing card using your mouse, this then takes you to a second video depending on which card you clicked on. My personal thoughts are that this is ‘too interactive’ to the extent where it tips the method. Here is a random example of what I mean on a video a found on YouTube (I do not know the person in the video):

In most ‘Interactive Magic Tricks’ the magician will attempt to read your mind or influence you in to making the decisions he/she wants you to make. I am trying to figure out how far away from this ‘usual’ way of doing you can stray before the video stop being interactive. For example if you where watching a video of a magician playing the ‘Three Card Monte’ game, and the magician was inviting you to guess where the ‘Ace’ was hidden. Would this still be classed as an ‘Interactive Magic Trick’? I would argue, yes it does, as the viewer at home is still being invited to make decisions? I would love to hear other peoples comments on this so please feel free to make some in the comments section.

Here is a video I filmed last night (no, not that sort of video!), it is a coin magic routine where I invite YOU the viewer at home to guess how many coins are in my hand. It is a classic of magic called ‘The Hopping Halves’ Please leave a comment and let me know if you think this is an ‘Interactive Magic Trick or not.

The ‘Hopping Halves’ routine was first published as Confusing Coins in Gen Magazine, April edition 1967, Volume 22, Number 12.